THE 1980S -STAGNATION

By the close of the 1970s, some countries in Africa were still under colonial
rule. South Africa was still struggling to eliminate apartheid and, in what
is now Zimbabwe, a liberation war was raging against the minority government,
which had pronounced a Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI) from Britain
in 1965. South West Africa, now Namibia, was also yet to achieve independence.
Elsewhere in the region, the territories of Western Sahara and Eritrea were
fighting for self-determination.

Civil and political strife in Africa were taking a large toll on human life
and on natural resources, which were being plundered to finance wars. In Mozambique,
for example, the civil war intensified in the 1980s, forcing millions to become
refugees in the neighbouring countries of Malawi, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania,
Zambia and Zimbabwe. At the height of the war, Malawi was host to more than
1 million Mozambicans-about 10 per cent of the country's population.

SOCIO-ECONOMIC ISSUES

Since independence, many African countries have persistently faced social and
economic challenges. Economic growth for most African countries has been sluggish
or negative, impacting heavily on the welfare of the people, especially the
rural population. In the 1980s, Africa underwent many economic experiments,
such as economic Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs), which have been blamed
in some countries for exacerbating poverty. The region's continued dependence
on external aid, and increasing external debt, illustrate the complete failure
of some of its social and economic policies, a number of which were prescribed
by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). SAPs in the region
led to, among other things, the removal by governments of subsidies on essential
services, such as education, health and transport; and a severe reduction of
jobs in the public service sector. These policies have resulted in: a reduction
in real income and purchasing power; an increase in the importance of the informal
economy and family labour; an increase in the relative price of many basic goods
and services; and a reduction in the quality of public services.

The negative impacts of SAPs have been heaviest on: the urban poor, who rely
most heavily on employment, consumer subsidies and public services; and rural
smallholder farmers, who relied on subsidies for their farm inputs. In urban
areas, wages and job opportunities declined considerably following the introduction
of SAPs.

The external debt problem in Africa heightened during the 1980s. The decade
between 1985-87 and 1995-97 saw 41 sub-Saharan countries sinking deeper into
debt (see Table 1.2). In some cases, the debt rose by more
than 150 per cent, as in the case of Angola, Chad and Lesotho. Debt-related
issues in the region are covered in more detail in Chapter
3 of this report.